Acceptance
by Dark Creation
Summary: Magus has found what he has spent most of his life looking for, but does he have the strength to reach out and touch what he has longed for. A look at Magus' inner conflicts and thier influence on his inner picture of Schala.


Acceptance  
  
Written By: Dark Creation  
  
Magus had reached a point of no return. Many nights he pondered over what he would say, what he would do, and how he would   
  
feel. Much of that contemplation was a scolding of himself. He, all too often, found himself saying 'What would Schala say if   
  
she saw what you did today?' He could never answer that question, but now he had a chance.  
  
The era was 1025 AD. He stood at a door in the village of Truce, contemplating himself before he opened it.  
  
"I am an animal."  
  
"No question."  
  
"She will hate me."  
  
"Probably."  
  
"I hate myself."  
  
"......No."  
  
"Why not? Plenty of other people do."  
  
"They don't know you."  
  
"I've caused too much pain, for myself and others, to not loathe what I've become."  
  
"You know too much of life to be resentful of your past."  
  
"My past is riddled with pain and death and..."  
  
"Enlightenment and redemption. Forget not what you learned"  
  
"What have I learned?"  
  
"Life is nothing of value. Only the experience is."  
  
"Such is the philosophy of a killer."  
  
"Maybe so, but it is true."  
  
"Says who?"  
  
"You."  
  
"I've been wrong before."  
  
"Not often. Not about this. You know this. You've been enlightened by one who knows more of death than anyone else alive."  
  
"He is hardly a credible source."  
  
"More credible than anyone else. How many people do you know that have been dead? Who've seen the afterlife?"  
  
"What about the gods?"  
  
"What about them. When did they ever do anything to gain your trust. Do you even know they exist? If they do, they have never  
  
done anything for you. They have never told you of what they wish."  
  
"What about Schala."  
  
"........"  
  
"I thought so."  
  
"If she is to hate you, it will be out of ignorance."  
  
"It's happened before."  
  
"Not her. She knows your nature far too well. She could tell you about every feeling you experienced without you saying a   
  
word. She understands, as you do. It just took you a little longer to realize it."  
  
"That still doesn't change what I did."  
  
"No, but it changes the signifigance of your actions."  
  
"I killed, there is no other way to define it."  
  
"You killed because you were supposed to. You know this, but you are bitter with yourself that you are the one, not Ozzie,   
  
not a plague, not even Lavos, you are responsible. Do you think you are the only one who has killed. Cyrus killed. Crono   
  
killed. Glenn Killed."  
  
"They retained their honor."  
  
"Yes, their honor. Each person defines themselves and no one else. To define yourself by another's definitions is to   
  
convict yourself. If there is anyone in the world who should understand that, it's you. It's what you fought for."  
  
"I fought to kill Lavos."  
  
"That was your intention, yes, but in acting on your desires, you gave hope to thousands of creatures that had none. What the   
  
humans did to the mystics was just as bad as what you did to the humans. It is a vicious circle, yes, but an important one."  
  
"What about the Ocean Palace?"  
  
"You did what you could. There was little else you could do. Saving Schala there would still have meant sacrificing lives,   
  
and by the standards your holding yourself to at this moment, that would have been worse that what you tried to do."  
  
"I was being selfish."  
  
"Everyone is selfish. To ensure life for one is to deny life for another. Unfortunatly, whenever you come to a critical impass in   
  
life, you seem to forget that."  
  
"She'll still hate me."  
  
"If she hates you, she hates you, but do not hate yourself, because if you do, you have no right walking through that door."  
  
".......I am cold, bloodthirsty, selfish animal."  
  
"Were you not, you would not be human."  
  
"That's not true, Schala....."  
  
"You keep comparing yourself to her. Schala would not have done what you did, yes. However, she would have been destroyed by   
  
the world that you were thrust into. Her strength is that she can allow herself to perish for her beliefs. Your strength is   
  
that you will not allow your beliefs to be destroyed. You are different people."  
  
"She'll still hate me."  
  
"If she hates you for what you had to do to be here today, to see her again and to ensure that nothing could happen to her,   
  
is she the same person that you loved in Zeal."  
  
".........."  
  
"Is she?"  
  
"....No."  
  
"Then go inside. No matter what happens, if she hates you or not, you'll know that the Schala that you loved still loves you   
  
back."  
  
Magus conceeded to himself. He moved to the door and knocked. He waited for a moment. The tension built in his body as he   
  
waited. The door opened and a woman emerged from behind it. She was very beautiful. Her beautiful blonde hair flowed like   
  
rays from the sun and her blue eyes seemed to be as deep as the oceans. He could see a part of her, but was still unsure.  
  
"Schala?" he asked timidly.  
  
"...Yes, may I help you?" She replied with a sense of recognition of who he was.  
  
"May I come inside?"  
  
"I don't know, I don't seem to know you, though you look oddly familar...." she was slow to trust him. His dark and   
  
intimidating appearance did not aid in his efforts.  
  
"You don't seem to remember me, but I know you. You have trust me on that."  
  
"Who are you?" she asked, giving up the effort of putting a name on the face that she found so familiar.  
  
"...You knew me a long time ago. Looking back on it, it was longer than both of us could truly fathom. I know you from the   
  
Kingdom of Zeal." As he said this, her eyes widened. "I last saw you in the ocean palace as you sent me away to avoid the   
  
fate that befell you. I knew you long before that as well. At that time I was not the man you see before you, but a boy that   
  
you found worth caring about when even his own mother deemed him worthless...." he stopped there, thinking back about those   
  
days. The young lady in front of him, meanwhile, had put together what he was saying to come up with only one possible   
  
solution.  
  
"...Janus?" she asked. She knew it was him, but she wanted to hear it from him. However, he found it difficult to say. He   
  
looked down at the ground then up at Schala and finally got up the strength to say it.  
  
"Yeah." was all he could muster, but it was enough. As soon as he said that she took him into the same loving embrace that   
  
she held him in when he was a small boy in Zeal. It did not matter that he was now a powerful warlock because he knew in that  
  
instance that he was not quite the animal he thought himself to be. This was his reward, this short, fleeting moment of   
  
nirvana was proof to him that he took the right path.  
  
"Come inside. I know we have some stories to tell each other." She said. This made him hesitate as she tried to lead him in.  
  
"I don't know if you'll want to hear my stories." he said. She looked at him lovingly and put her hands on his shoulders.  
  
"You'd be surprised by what I already know. I understand what happened and nothing was you fault."  
  
"But, but how? How could you know?"  
  
"Lucca told me. She told me about you. She said that you were a man torn between finding what he lost and doing what he was   
  
meant to do. I don't care about what you did. I just care that your here. Now come inside and tell me your story."  
  
Fin  
  
I hope you enjoyed this little viginette. For those of you who were a bit confused by the lines of dialogue the occured   
  
before he spoke with Schala, that was the conflict within Magus as he debated within himself whether or not to enter that   
  
door and accept was laid ahead of him. I always found that difficult to potray in my earlier works, so I spent some time   
  
thinking about it from a moral and spiritual standpoint that this is what I felt that Magus came to know through his   
  
experience. I often looked at my earler pieces, especially those that refered to Magus confronting his past for Schala, and   
  
found myself thinking that the conflict within needed to be fleshed out more. Why I did not act upon it in my previous   
  
stories, I do not know. Perhaps it was immaturity as a writer, who knows. Anyway, to those who review this, thank you.   
  
As I said before, I hope everyone who reads it enjoyed it. And on one final note, I'm sorry I have not updated The Prophet's   
  
Apprentice in such a long time. Between college, work, my original fiction and some great games in the world of sports being   
  
played, I haven't gotten around to it. I do intend to work on it a bit more as well as begin work on a revision of Struggle   
  
for Happiness that more reflects the story that I tried to convey, while retaining the strength of the narration style and   
  
the key moments. Thank you for listening to my long winded authors notes. Adieu...  
  
Dark Creation 


End file.
